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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26053060">Gut Feelings and Guardian Angels</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/wackyjacqs/pseuds/wackyjacqs'>wackyjacqs</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Bizarre Holidays [236]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Stargate SG-1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Episode: s07e11-12 Evolution, F/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 10:20:51</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,635</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26053060</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/wackyjacqs/pseuds/wackyjacqs</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam’s face still aches from where the Super Soldier backhanded her and yet she’s unable to contain her smile at the colonel’s offer of lunch.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Samantha "Sam" Carter/Jack O'Neill</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Bizarre Holidays [236]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1234973</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>89</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Gut Feelings and Guardian Angels</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for ‘Be An Angel Day’ (22 August), which is a day to celebrate help from unexpected sources, whether it’s a friend, team, or complete stranger. Tag for season 7’s ‘Evolution’.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Her face still hurts from where the Super Soldier backhanded her and yet Sam finds herself unable to stop a smile at the colonel’s offer of lunch. They walk side by side out of the gate room and she’s vaguely aware of how close they are but neither attempt to widen the gap; instead, she feels him watching her, stealing glimpses out of the corner of his eye, as if he’s trying to convince himself that she really has made it back home and she’s now here beside him.</p>
<p>“So,” he finally offers, and she turns her head slightly. His gaze falls to the sling on her arm. “Anything I need to know about?”</p>
<p>She thinks back to the mission and what they relayed to him and General Hammond just moments earlier. In all honesty, she is concerned about the army Anubis has amassed without their knowledge, but she’s also able to take a little comfort in the fact that by destroying his ability to make more soldiers, they've bought themselves some precious time. They also, now, have a potential device they can use in the fight against Anubis which is an advantage they didn’t have hours earlier. But Sam knows that’s not what he's really asking. He’s asking about her and her injuries. She’s in some pain and as only a little adrenaline remains in her body, tiredness is also starting to creep in, but she thinks she's fine.</p>
<p>They all made it home, in one relative piece, and that’s all that matters right now. She doesn’t tell him any of her thoughts however and simply says, “Nothing that can’t wait until the briefing, sir.”</p>
<p>“Yes, well,” he says carefully as he studies her for a moment longer and Sam suspects he knows she’s hiding something from him, but he refrains from saying anything else as they catch up with the others at the elevators.</p>
<p>“I’m fine,” she comments softly, only it’s apparently still loud enough for her dad to overhear and he turns to face her.</p>
<p>“Is everything okay, Sam?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, dad,” she says. She then gives him a look, silently pleading with him to drop the subject, but he glances at Jack instead and she knows he’s caught their unspoken conversation. The colonel keeps his attention on Jacob and Sam knows what’s coming next when he speaks.</p>
<p>“I was just asking Carter if she needed to see the Doc.”</p>
<p>“Sir, I –”</p>
<p>“She probably does,” Jacob interrupts, “she took a bang to the head.”</p>
<p>Sam stares at her dad in disbelief as she lets her good arm fall by her side. Okay, so she hit her head when she fell and was briefly unconscious, but she’s suffered worse injuries before. It’s on the tip of her tongue to remind them both of this fact when they continue their conversation and she wonders when she suddenly turned invisible because they are still talking <em>about</em> her and not <em>to</em> her and for some reason she’s putting down to the head injury, it’s starting to grate on her nerves.</p>
<p>She’s stopped from responding however as the elevator arrives. The rest of SG-1, plus Bra’tac and Jacob step onto the elevator but just as Sam is about to follow, the Colonel reaches out and places a hand against the side of the doors, effectively blocking her path with his arm. She begrudgingly looks at him.</p>
<p>“Sir?”</p>
<p>“Carter?”</p>
<p>When she gestures towards his arm, his eyebrows rise slightly. “We’re taking a rain check on lunch.”</p>
<p>“But sir –”</p>
<p>“You took a knock to the head, Major. You know the protocol.”</p>
<p>“But –”</p>
<p>
  <em>“Ah!”</em>
</p>
<p>She huffs out a breath and stares at him wide-eyed and innocent, but her commanding officer shows no signs of relenting.</p>
<p>“Don’t give me those eyes, Carter,” he mumbles so only she can hear.</p>
<p>She counts to five. “I promise I’ll go and see Janet as soon as the briefing is over.” But Jack continues to study her as he tries to decide whether she really is well enough to skip the check-up for a while longer or whether he should go with his gut instinct and haul her off to the infirmary; but she’s also vaguely aware that her father is now watching their little interaction. “Please, sir?”</p>
<p>“You have fifteen minutes to grab some lunch and then I’m escorting you to the infirmary,” he sighs.</p>
<p>Sam desperately wants to argue, but she knows this is one fight she’s not going to win – especially as she should, technically, be in the infirmary right now – so she takes the olive branch for what it is and smiles.</p>
<p>“Fine.”</p>
<p>He holds her gaze for a moment longer, then steps aside so she can get onto the elevator. Somehow, though, he manages to end up standing behind her and to the right and she can feel his eyes on her as he tries to identify the other injuries she might be hiding. There isn’t anything really; her face hurts and the pain in her arm is slowly worsening, but she doesn’t think it’s worth mentioning. Nothing is broken and she knows Janet will soon learn about the bumps and bruises and report back, but Sam is so caught up with her thoughts that she doesn’t expect the elevator to stop when it does and the movement makes her feel lightheaded. She closes her eyes for a brief moment to try and stop the spinning and when she finally looks up, the colonel is frowning at her.</p>
<p>“I’m fine,” she says to his unspoken question as she carefully steps into the corridor.</p>
<p>“Sure you are,” he replies glibly.</p>
<p>She says nothing but offers her dad a half-smile as he holds the door open and she enters the mess hall. It’s relatively quiet – in terms of people and noise for which she’s thankful – and she briefly thinks about joining the line food but now that she’s here, she realizes she isn’t hungry and even if she was, she’s not fully sure she’ll actually be able to keep her lunch down. There’s a light pressure on her left elbow and then the colonel’s lips are near her ear.</p>
<p>“Grab a seat, Carter,” he says quietly as he steers her towards an empty table at the far side of the room.</p>
<p>“Sir, I –”</p>
<p>“I’ve got it,” he interrupts.</p>
<p>When she doesn’t immediately follow his order, his eyebrows raise, silently challenging her to say something, and she bites back a sigh but it’s only when she sits down that he lets his hand fall by his side. He gives her a soft smile and turns on his heel and she watches as he makes his way across the mess but instead of joining the back of the queue, he heads for the middle of it to where her father is standing. She can see them talking but can’t make out what they are saying from this distance, but she does catch her dad’s gaze drift over the colonel’s shoulder to her. As if that was a mistake, the colonel tenses before her dad looks away, meets Jack’s eye and then nods. It takes a few more seconds before her commanding officer eases his stance and Sam sighs. She realizes they’ve been talking about her and she’s pretty sure her father has informed the colonel that her injury is worse than she’s been letting on.</p>
<p>Without warning, the man himself glances over his shoulder and meets her eye. His concern is evident and Sam self-consciously touches her face where the Super Soldier hit her before she averts her gaze to the table top. She lets out a deep breath and closes her eyes. Now that she is sitting down and the adrenaline is starting to wear off, she doesn’t feel as good as she thought she did. She’s sore, and exhausted, and there’s definitely a headache planned for later. With her good hand, she rubs at her temple but she must zone out because the next thing she knows, a plastic tray laden with two sandwiches, a glass of blue Jell-O, and a bottle of water appear in her line of vision right before Jack sits opposite her. Somehow, he’s the first one back to the table and when she looks over his shoulder, she sees her dad and the rest of her team still in the queue and she frowns.</p>
<p>“How did you –”</p>
<p>“Colonel’s privilege,” he grins, before he slides a chicken sandwich across the table towards her, “Eat.”</p>
<p>She carefully picks up the sandwich and takes a bite, but it proves a challenge to follow the request: her face hurts more than she realizes; she doesn’t have an appetite; and the colonel is staring at her with an expression that looks a little like, ‘I told you so’. She manages to swallow the mouthful of food before she sets it down and pushes it away.</p>
<p>Sam hears a sigh from the other side of the table. She doesn’t look up, but from the corner of her eye she sees Jack set his own sandwich down before he gets to his feet and comes to stand by her side.</p>
<p>“C’mon,” he says gently, “let’s get you checked out.”</p>
<p>His voice breaks through the fog in her head and then his hand rests carefully on her good arm as he encourages her to stand up and she finds herself involuntarily leaning against him for support as she tries not to pass out.</p>
<p>“I’ve got you, Carter,” he mumbles in her ear as he adjusts his hold on her and she’s so focused on how nice it feels to hear him say the words and just <em>be there</em> for her that she misses the way her dad watches them navigate their way around the tables, or the knowing look that’s on his face, as they leave.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I know the title doesn’t really fit the holiday, but I guess one could argue Jack is being protective of Sam and thus, by extension, is her guardian angel in this episode... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ </p>
<p>No? Just me? Okay.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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